Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian An Essential Grammar

Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian: An Essential Grammar is intended for beginners and intermediate students who need a reference that explains grammar in straightforward terms. It covers all the main areas of the modern single BCMS grammatical system in an accessible way, and free from jargon. When linguistic terminology is used, it is explained in layman’s terms, the logic of a rule is presented simply and near parallels are drawn with English. This book covers all the grammar necessary for everyday communication (reaching B1 and B2 of the CEFR, ACTFL Intermediate-Intermediate- Mid). The book comprises of extensive chapters on all parts of speech, the creation of different word forms (endings for cases in nouns and adjectives, case forms for pronouns, tenses, verbal modes, verbal aspect etc.) and their uses in sentences. Each rule is illustrated with numerous examples from everyday living language used in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro and Serbia. Thisis a unique reference book in English aimed at the level of language study that treats BCMS as a single grammar system, explaining and highlighting all the small differences between the four variants of this polycentric language.

Introduction How to use this book List of abbreviations The story of "four languages" 1.1. Ekavian and Iyekavian pronunciations 1.2. Number of speakers, official language names 1.3. Brief outline of main grammatical differences 2. Alphabet, pronunciation, spelling 2.1. Vowels 2.2. Consonants 2.2.1. Voiced/unvoiced consonants 2.2.2. Soft/hard consonants 2.3. Consonant and vowel alternations 2.3.1. Consonant softening before -E (palatalisation) 2.3.2. Consonant softening before -I (sibilarisation) 2.3.3. J-changes (yotation) 2.3.4. Voicing assimilation 2.3.5. L/O changes 2.3.6. Fleeting -a- 2.3.7. Removal of a duplicated consonant 2.3.8. Multiple alternations 3. Nouns 3.1. Gender 3.1.1. Masculine nouns 3.1.2. Feminine nouns 3.1.3. Neuter nouns 3.2. Plural (nominative plural) 3.2.1. Masculine nouns 3.2.2. Feminine nouns 3.2.3. Neuter nouns 3.2.4. Neuter collective nouns 3.3. Cases 3.3.1. Cases in English and BCMS 3.3.2. The First and Second Declensions singular 3.3.3. Nominative 3.3.4. Genitive 3.3.5. Dative 3.3.6. Accusative 3.3.7. Vocative 3.3.8. Instrumental 3.3.9. Locative 3.3.10. Accusative vs Locative (destination vs location) 3.3.11. First and Second Declension plural 3.3.12. Genitive plural 3.3.13. The Third Declension (Feminine nouns ending in a consonant) 3.3.14. Frequently used nouns displaying irregularities in declension 3.3.15. Only plural nouns (Pluralia tantum) 4. Adjectives 4.1. Descriptive and relational adjectives 4.2. Gender 4.3. Short - long forms 4.4. Case endings 4.4.1. Short form cases 4.5. Possessive adjectives (Markov, Vesnin) 4.6. Comparison 4.6.1. Comparative 4.6.2. Superlative 4.6.3. How to say "than"? 5. Pronouns 5.1. Personal pronouns 5.2. Possessive pronouns 5.2.1. Svoj - possessive-reflexive pronoun for all persons 5.3. Demonstrative pronouns ovaj - taj - onaj, ovakav, ovoliki 5.4. Interrogative pronouns ko (tko), šta (što), koji, ciji, kakav, koliki 5.5. Relative pronouns koji, što, ciji, kakav 5.6. Indefinite pronouns 5.6.1. Emphasised indefinite pronouns (whatever, whoever) 5.7. Reflexive pronoun sebe (se) 5.8. Pronoun sav, sva, sve (all, whole) 5.9. Pronoun sam, sama, samo 6. Numerals 6.1. Cardinal numbers 6.1.1. Cardinal numbers agreement with nouns, pronouns and adjectives 6.2. Ordinal numbers 6.3. Collective numbers -oro (two people, three people) 6.4. Numerical nouns -ica (two men, three men) 6.5. Approximate numbers -ak 6.6. Fractions -ina 6.7. Numerals acting as a subject 6.8. Numbers used in dates 6.8.1. Days of the week 6.8.2. Months of the year 6.9. How to tell the time 6.10. Expressing age 7. Verbs 7.1. Infinitives 7.2. Conjugations 7.2.1. Present tense stem 7.2.2. Three Conjugations 7.3. Types of verbs 7.3.1. Transitive/intransitive verbs 7.3.2. Auxiliary verbs a) biti b) htjeti=hteti 7.3.3. Regular verbs, pattern verbs, irregular verbs 7.3.4. Perfective/Imperfective verbs 7.3.5. Verbs of motion 7.3.6. Modal verbs 7.3.7. Reflexive verbs 7.4. Tenses 7.4.1. Present tense 7.4.2. Past tense (Perfect tense) 7.4.3. Future tense 7.4.4. Future Exact 7.5. Moods 7.5.1. Imperative 7.5.2. Potential mode 7.6. Participles 7.6.1. L-participle 7.6.2. Passive participle 7.7. Conditional clauses 7.7.1. Realistic - ako 7.7.2. Currently possible - kad(a) 7.7.3. Unrealistic - da 7.8. Passive voice 7.8.1. Present passive 7.8.2. Past and future passive 7.9. Verbal adverbs 7.9.1. Present verbal adverb 7.9.2. Past verbal adverb 8. Adverbs 8.1. -LY adverbs and equivalents in BCMS 8.2. Comparison 8.3. As stand-alone words 8.4. Learning tip: adverb families 8.4.1. ne-, ni-, -i adverbs 8.4.2. ov-, t-, on- adverbs 8.4.3. Emphasised indefinite adverbs (wherever, whenever) 9. Prepositions 9.1. Prepositions used with only one case 9.1.1. Only with the genitive 9.1.2. Only with the dative 9.1.3. Only with the accusative 9.2. Prepositions used with two cases 9.2.1. Used with the locative or accusative 9.2.2. Used with the instrumental or accusative 9.2.3. Learning tip: when to use U, when NA 9.2.4. Correlation between U - IZ and NA - SA 9.3. Prepositions with verbs of motion 10. Conjunctions and particles 10.1. Simple conjunctions 10.2. Compound conjunctions 10.3. Particles 11. Sentence structure 11.1. Free word order 11.2. Enclitics 11.3. Direct and indirect speech 11.3.1. Reporting statements 11.3.2. Reporting questions 11.4. Predicate-only sentences 11.4.1. Impersonal predicate-only sentences 11.4.2. Personalised predicate-only sentences 11.5. Negative sentences - multiple negatives 12. Word creation 12.1. The power of word creation 12.2. Nouns 12.2.1. Suffixes for professions, doers, athletes 12.2.2. Suffixes for ethnicities, city dwellers, regional populations 12.2.3. -CIJA suffix for adopting foreign words 12.2.4. Diminutives 12.2.5. Augmentatives 12.2.6. Location suffixes 12.2.7. Suffix naming types of meat 12.2.8. Suffixes for abstract nouns 12.2.9. Verbal nouns -NJE 12.2.10. Negative nouns NE- 12.3. Adjectives 12.3.1. Relational adjectives 12.3.2. Descriptive adjectives 12.3.3. Adjective prefixes pre-, bez-, ne- 12.4. Verbs 12.4.1. Suffixes that change foreign words into verbs 12.4.2. Prefixes 13. Croatian/Serbian glossary - most common vocabulary differences 13.1. Nouns 13.2. Adjectives 13.3. Verbs 13.4. Adverbs 13.5. Everyday expressions 14. Verb conjugation tables 14.1. Irregular verbs 14.1.1. biti 14.1.2. moci 14.1.3. htjeti = hteti 14.1.4. slati 14.2. A conjugation (regular) 14.3. I conjugation (regular) 14.3.1. I conjugation pattern -eti -im 14.3.2. I conjugation pattern -ati -im 14.4. E conjugation patterns 14.4.1. Pattern -ati -em a) stajati - stajem b) pisati - pišem c) zvati - zovem 14.4.2. Pattern -ati -anem 14.4.3. Pattern -avati -ajem 14.4.4. Pattern -ovati -ujem 14.4.5. Pattern -ivati -ujem 14.4.6. Pattern -eti -em a) umjeti-umijem b) donijeti-donesem c) uzeti-uzmem 14.4.7. Pattern -iti -ijem 14.4.8. Pattern -uti -ujem 14.4.9. Pattern -nuti -nem 14.4.10. -STI infinitives a) Pattern -sti -dem b) Pattern -sti -dnem or -tnem c) Pattern -sti -zem d) Pattern -sti -stem 14.4.11. -CI infinitives a) Pattern -ci -dem b) Pattern -ci -dem c) Pattern -ci, -gnem, or -knem d) Pattern -ci, -cem Bibliography Index

Željko Vrabec has professional translation experience gained at the BBC and the UN. He is a multilingual specialist with over 25 years of BBC editorial experience in different roles – from copy-editing breaking European stories andwriting in-depth political analytical reports to media landscape surveys. Recently he has worked as a dialogue coach and cultural approximation consultant to Oscar-winning actors. In the past few years he has been teaching BCMS at a language school in London.